• Their goal was to get attendees to take a pledge to donate their fortunes to charity within their lifetimes

• One Chinese billionaire joined them in saying he would do so. As a result, 41 of the wealthiest worldwide have made the pledge.

• Buffet and Gates said they would not do follow-up calls in China, as they had after previous dinners. “What happens in China (philanthropically) is up to the Chinese.”

• They said the guests at the Beijing dinner asked similar questions to those heard in the U.S.

• One reason for philanthropic hesitancy is attributed to the fact that the majority of the wealth in China has occurred in the past 30 years. It’s usually a challenge for the first generation of wealth in any culture to grasp their role in philanthropy.